Police Brutality, Racism, and the Need for Action

Jelani Cobb, Ph.D., is the Ira A. Lipman Professor of Journalism at Columbia University. He has contributed to The New Yorker since 2012 and became a staff writer in 2015. He is the recipient of the 2015 Sidney Hillman Award for Opinion and Analysis and writes frequently about race, politics, history and culture. He was most recently an associate professor of history and director of the Africana Studies Institute at the University of Connecticut where he specialized in post-Civil War African American history, 20th century American politics and the history of the Cold War. Dr. Cobb is also a recipient of fellowships from the Fulbright and Ford Foundations. Andrea James is the founder and executive director of Families for Justice as Healing, the founder of the National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls, a 2015 Soros Justice Fellow, and the author of Upper Bunkies Unite: And Other Thoughts…